In the World of the High Tech Redneck, the Graybeard is the old guy who earned his gray by making all the mistakes, and tries to keep the young 'uns from repeating them. Silicon Graybeard is my term for an old hardware engineer; a circuit designer. The focus of this blog is on doing things, from radio to home machine shops and making all kinds of things, along with comments from a retired radio engineer running from tech or science news to economics; from firearms to the world at large.

While it could be, I suspect that we have a ways to go yet, and exits from that highway still remain, barring any black swan moments that change everything. Have we had our Archduke Ferdinand moment already, and we didn't notice it? I've heard the actual Archduke Ferdinand moment wasn't thought of as a harbinger of doom when it happened, either.

I have to admit that I'm puzzled about the real relationship between China and the Norks. While lots of people say that L'il Kim doesn't take a dump with Chinese approval, I wonder if China doesn't see him as problem; a liability. Perhaps he has his uses, he can do totally insane shit and they can watch our reactions to it, but it has to be apparent to the Chicoms as well as the whole world that he's FN.

The pessimistic, paranoid way of looking at the situation is that China put their troops there in case we did something to North Korea. The argument is that the Korean War (which had plenty of Chinese troops in it) never ended; there has just been a long ceasefire. There has been talk of us preemptively striking Pyongyang if we "knew" they had put a nuke on an ICBM and were in position to strike us. If we were to strike Pyongyang, China could claim their interest is to stabilize this country on their southern border and are only acting out of "humanitarian concern". That could potentially put Chinese and American forces shooting at each other.

On the other hand, Zerohedge reports something more along the lines of what I was thinking: if he gets too FN, China will take Kim out themselves. China knows North Korea is on the verge of a very big nuclear test, likely on or about the 15th, and is telling Kim that if they cause any trouble, the Chinese will wipe out North Korea's nuclear program themselves.

The editorial in the military-focused Global Times tabloid, owned and operated by the Communist Party's People's Daily newspaper, said that North Korea’s nuclear activities must not jeopardize northeastern China, and that if the North impacts China with its illicit nuclear tests through either "nuclear leakage or pollution", then China will respond with force.

“China has a bottom line that it will protect at all costs, that is,
the security and stability of northeast China... If the bottom line is
touched, China will employ all means available including the military
means to strike back. By that time, it is not an issue of
discussion whether China acquiesces in the US’ blows, but the Chinese
People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will launch attacks to DPRK nuclear
facilities on its own."

Trial attorneys are known for sometimes saying something they can't substantiate in court. When the opposition objects and the quote is taken out of the reporter's notes, it can not be taken out of jurors minds. Google is even better. This could have been floated by the Chinese, long enough to be sure Google would cache it, and then taken away.

I know that one of the two ways North Koreans can escape the "hermit kingdom" is to flee north into China. China generally returns them to the Norks, who generally torture them and any family they have to death. I don't think the population of North Korea would be difficult for China to absorb, but I have no idea what ethnic feelings they may have toward each other. From an economic standpoint, South Korea is a bit of a competitor to China, although a distant 11th place in the world GDP rankings compared to China at #2; China is tremendously larger country. I could see China not wanting a unified Korean peninsula if it was an economic competitor.

Back to Zerohedge's summary of the Global Times piece for an interesting conclusion:

The report also said that "the DPRK must not fall into the turmoil to
send a large number of refugees, it is not allowed to have a government
that is hostile against China on the other side of the Yalu River, and
the US military must not push forward its forces to the Yalu River.” It
notes that "this sentence is meant for the United States, because the
premise of it is that the US military has launched attacks to the DPRK."

But what may be the most notable part of the oped is the mention in
the Global Times editorial that North Korea will not be "not allowed to
have a government that is hostile against China on the other side of the
Yalu River." This implies that if and when the US initiate strikes on
NK, the Chinese PLA will likely send out troops "to lay the foundation"
for a favorable post-war situation.

In other words, China may be just waiting for Trump to "decapitate"
the North Korean regime, to pounce and immediately fill the power
vacuum.

It makes me wonder if Trump and China's President Xi discussed this last weekend. Comments from anyone with good, in-depth knowledge of the area are appreciated, as always.

The chubby kid likes viewing military demonstrations; it wouldn't surprise me if Something Went Terribly Wrong at one of them, leading to Many Days of Organized State-Supervised Mourning followed by very, very quiet Chinese assistance at overcoming the difficulties of a leadership transition.

There's enough internal restlessness that I doubt the Chinese relish the idea of additional turmoil on their border; it would appear to be to everyone's benefit were certain problems cease to be problems in an acceptable manner.

i understand from a good source that the 150k troops are largely medical, logistics, and support personnel much like you would send to a natural disaster. that would indicate china will let trump do the deed and they will clean up the mess so to speak. i can't say china taking north korea wouldn't bite us in the butt later. i don't think trump is thinking this thing thru.

NK is a wildcard. They would/could invade the South. They have a very large well equipped military. They could nuke the South Korea. I seriously would not put it past the crazy chubby dictator. Or they could nuke/attack Japan. NK hates Japan and vice versa. Or they can continue to assist other belligerent countries to get nukes. All of these things are bad and all of them are if not likely certainly quite possible. What is needed is that someone give him the same treatment he gave his half brother.

I know that China very much does NOT want a US friendly regime on their doorstep in place of North Korea; a unified Korea that is a western friendly democracy is one of their worst nightmares. I suspect they would be ok with a quiet lightly armed 'neutral' next to them, the way that Finland was during the Cold War next to the USSR.

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Retired radio engineer, follower of Christ, RF designer, mentor. Radio ham, home shop machinist, lapidary, silversmith, roadie cyclist, learning to be a rifleman, and home defender, - a guy with too many interests to keep track of.

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